WORK LIFE IN THE 21ST CENTURY: “Holy smokes. We’ve reached a new low. First people wanted to stop interacting in person. Now they don’t want to be seen on screen.”

MY NEW YORK POST COLUMN: Disinformation starts at the top — with America’s elites.

CHRIS WRAY LIES TO CONGRESS:

Josh Hawley is fed up with Chris Wray:

"You said we do not go to priests and ask them about their parishioners. You said we do not. You didn't say we haven't. You didn't say we won't. You said we don't. It turns out you do." pic.twitter.com/UKuEVTYhjK

— Citizen Free Press (@CitizenFreePres) December 5, 2023

Ya think Merrick Garland will prosecute him?

OPEN THREAD: Now blast off. I said, blast off.

THE NEW SPACE RACE: China’s Landspace gears up for 3rd launch of its methane-powered rocket.

ONE OF THEM IS A NEW CABLE FROM APPLE, OF COURSE: Uploading Your Mind to a Computer Will Require 3 Crucial Things. And the cable will change every couple of years. “You’re still using a BI-2 Brain Interface cable? Everyone else has moved on to the BI-4!” “Meh, I just use the adapter dongle.”

WELL, GOOD: New Catalyst Completely Breaks Down Durable Plastic Pollution in Minutes.

LOL:

Public Educators Warn Low Literacy Rates May Prevent Kids From Reading About Gay Sex https://t.co/VWKhn9cQpw pic.twitter.com/Xk93AR97IA

— The Babylon Bee (@TheBabylonBee) December 5, 2023

HMM. CAUSE AND EFFECT ARE UNCLEAR HERE. Your personality might help shield you from dementia, researchers say.

I UNDERSTAND ELON WILL TEST ITS BULLETPROOFNESS BY DRIVING THROUGH CHICAGO ONE NIGHT THIS WEEKEND: 2024 Tesla Cybertruck First Look: Really Here, Really Looks Like That.

NOT RECOMMENDED: EV fire in carport was likely caused by the toaster used to warm the battery: This is not an approved method for anything except making toast.

WHY DOES THIS SOUND LIKE AN EXCUSE FOR SOME SORT OF CORPORATE POWER GRAB? Powerful financial giants could play vital role in preventing the next pandemic, say researchers.

Yes, I’ve gotten cynical.

LOL, PULL THE OTHER ONE: In the realm of law school rankings and affirmative action: “There is no subterfuge here.”

IT’S CALLED THE BIDEN ERA: That Lingering ‘Meh’ Feeling Has a Name.

SOMEONE SHOULD ASK PENN PRESIDENT LIZ MAGILL HOW THEY CAN BE TRYING TO FIRE AMY WAX WHILE TOLERATING OPEN JEW-HATRED ON CAMPUS: Harvard, MIT and Penn Presidents Testify Before Congress About Campus Antisemitism.

The presidents of Harvard University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University of Pennsylvania testified Tuesday at a congressional hearing about efforts to curb rising antisemitism on their campuses.

Claudine Gay of Harvard, Liz Magill of Penn and Sally Kornbluth of MIT acknowledged to lawmakers that antisemitism was a growing problem at their schools. The school leaders said they are taking steps to combat hate, including beefing up security on campuses and taking action against anyone who harasses or discriminates against students, faculty or staff. They also said their schools want to ensure the safety of their students while still protecting free speech.

“The right to free speech does not extend to harassment, discrimination or incitement to violence in our community,” Kornbluth said.

College campuses have been riled by protests since the start of the Israel-Hamas war, with hundreds or even thousands of students, faculty and staff at schools around the country joining pro-Palestinian rallies. Jewish leaders say chants such as “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” and “Globalize the intifada” are incitements to violence against Israelis and Jews more broadly.

Students and alumni groups say anti-Jewish antagonism has increased amid the rising tensions, prompting calls for schools to do more to protect Jewish students from bigotry. The universities represented at the hearing Tuesday are all private institutions, but Congress has some oversight role because the schools receive significant federal funding for research and student financial aid.

Their sensitivity seems quite selective.

GETTING TOUGH: States Warn AP About Helping Hamas.

WQCS-FM, an NPR affiliate, reported, “Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody and a coalition of attorneys general have issued issued a warning to media companies with possible ties to foreign terrorist organizations.

“Attorney General Moody and the coalition sent a letter reminding the publisher of the New York Times, the CEO of the Associated Press, the CEO and editor-in-chief of CNN and the president of Reuters that providing material support to terrorists and terror organizations is a crime. This follows reports that individuals hired by these outlets have troubling ties to Hamas.”

Attorneys general in 14 states put the press on notice: Quit hiring terrorists as photo journalists because it is against the law.

Republican Attorney General Brenna Bird of Iowa wrote the letter, which was signed by attorneys general in Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Montana, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia and West Virginia.

Honest Reporting reported a month ago, “On October 7, Hamas terrorists were not the only ones who documented the war crimes they had committed during their deadly rampage across southern Israel. Some of their atrocities were captured by Gaza-based photojournalists working for the Associated Press and Reuters news agencies whose early morning presence at the breached border area raises serious ethical questions.

“What were they doing there so early on what would ordinarily have been a quiet Saturday morning? Was it coordinated with Hamas? Did the respectable wire services, which published their photos, approve of their presence inside enemy territory, together with the terrorist infiltrators? Did the photojournalists who freelance for other media, like CNN and the New York Times, notify these outlets? Judging from the pictures of lynching, kidnapping and storming of an Israeli kibbutz, it seems like the border has been breached not only physically, but also journalistically.

“Four names appear on AP’s photo credits from the Israel-Gaza border area on October 7: Hassan Eslaiah, Yousef Masoud, Ali Mahmud, and Hatem Ali.

“Eslaiah, a freelancer who also works for CNN, crossed into Israel, took photos of a burning Israeli tank, and then captured infiltrators entering Kibbutz Kfar Azza.”

Those were not news photos. Those were souvenirs. The terrorists documented their war crimes and AP and the rest paid for a few of them.

Read the whole thing.

MICHAEL WALSH: ‘Emergency! Everybody to Get from Planet.’

EVERYTHING IS GOING SWIMMINGLY: Health offices warn of shortage of syphilis drug as cases rise.

HEH:

If you insist…https://t.co/ki9KL7eG6q https://t.co/gZDDfriZF9

— The Boring Company (@boringcompany) December 5, 2023

WHAT, NOT A WHITE GUY IN A MAGA HAT? ‘Middle-aged Black male’ vandalized FSU Black Student Union house: report.

THE ENEMY WITHIN: Columbia University Students Announce Event Celebrating Hamas’s Oct. 7 Attack.

COLLUSION: A Star Misinformation Scholar Says Harvard Pushed Her Out for Criticizing Meta. “Joan Donovan, a leading scholar of online-disinformation campaigns, is going public about why she believes she was recently forced out of Harvard University’s Kennedy School: because her research threatened the school’s financial ties to the social-media behemoth Meta.”

MARK JUDGE: The Vampire and the Pope: Remembering My Brief, Beautiful Catholic Friendship with Anne Rice.

BUT OF COURSE: Hamas scuttled truce to avoid releasing Israeli rape victims, State Department suggests.

BRENDAN O’NEILL: Revenge of the feudalists: COP28 confirms that environmentalism is an ugly revolt against modernity.